No, they're starting their own service because they don't realize how much they need Apple. Tons of companies have started their own competing services, have any been remotely successful. And they'll realize it once their service is running and nobody is using it...and they end up shutting it down before long.
NBC can't win, apple has all the leverage.
Just look at it this way:
1 NBC goes on their own
2 NBC has to tell stockholders that profits are down
3 Stockholders: "Why?"
4 NBC: "iTunes revenues are gone and hulu revenues come nowhere close to replacing that lost revenue"
5 Stockholders tear NBC a new one
6 NBC goes groveling back to apple and signs with itunes again
I hope it goes that way. Then again, if NBC somehow pulls through and succeeds Apple could be in a whole lot of trouble.
Way to go, NBC/Universal. First, I can't buy your content on the industry-leading Blu-Ray high def format, and now I can't buy it on iTunes!
It's like you're actually trying to limit the market for your content, which sounds like a winning strategy! I'd say you owe a big bonus of bananas to whichever chimp is running the show over there!
Not so sure about that. NBC just has to sell ads to support "Hulu" and they are already good at selling ads on TV. I wouldn't doubt that they'll be smarter about offering content for sale, and that content could easily be moved into iTunes once purchased... and they get all the profits, and absorb all of the costs to do this.
But they'll need traffic to sell adds. It's a tough business to break into at this point.
All of this sounds like pre-negotiation noise......
NBC needs Apple as much, if not more, than the other way around. It is a close-to-last-place major network that is seeking traction. The parent company GE is watching closely for any missteps. If they dump a major distribution channel that offers it a future growth opportunity, I am sure that Mr. Immelt will have a word or two for NBC's leadership.
That said, I don't see why NBC shouldn't have greater say over bundling or repricing its content. The iTunes store has become an incoherent clutter anyway (compared to its original simplicity and elegance), and it is not clear to me that adding things such as bundling (or even differential pricing) will add much to the mess that it has already become. Just add two extra icons/links to the millions already there: "Bundles" and "Not $1.99." No one will notice.
The article in the Times today says just the opposite. Apple needs them more. NBC's sales over iTunes is not important to them yet, while Apple's entire strategy depends on it.
Like it or not, Jobs is going to have to learn to cooperate more. Right now, he's got a case of Hubris. Just because it's worked in the past doesn't mean that it will continue to work.
I don't understand the NBCs position on this. It seems to me that they are negotiating from a position of weakness. I can hear SJ talking to the NBC guys now; "there's this thing called BitTorrent. Have you heard of it?'
iPods will sell. NBC and the other studios can get on iTunes and make some money off the iPod train or they can get steamrolled by it.
No, they're starting their own service because they don't realize how much they need Apple. Tons of companies have started their own competing services, have any been remotely successful. And they'll realize it once their service is running and nobody is using it...and they end up shutting it down before long.
NBC can't win, apple has all the leverage.
Just look at it this way:
1 NBC goes on their own
2 NBC has to tell stockholders that profits are down
3 Stockholders: "Why?"
4 NBC: "iTunes revenues are gone and hulu revenues come nowhere close to replacing that lost revenue"
5 Stockholders tear NBC a new one
6 NBC goes groveling back to apple and signs with itunes again
Not true at all. That is a fanboy perception. None of the Tv or movie companies are selling enough over iTunes to make even the slightest dent in their sales.
The reason why Apple has been so unsuccessful in getting movies, and to a lessor extent Tv shows, is because companies are sitting back to see what will happen.
None of them, including Disney, wants Apple to have control over their distribution or profits.
So if ONE network leaves, they won't have ANY content to sell? I guess you missed the tons of other shows available on iTunes? NBC would only make a dent if they got all the other networks to join them and negociate together. Leaving on their own will just increase piracy of their material and decrease the number of people watching their shows.
And NBC has had many of the lowest ranked shows for the last couple years, with a couple exceptions like Heroes, their ratings have been awful. With a lineup as bad as theirs, will people miss them much?
According to the Times today, Universal has 4-% of the video content sales on iTunes.
If they pull this off, then others will do the same thing. The article said that the other companies are eyeing this carefully.
We may see an agreement though. Apple might give in to a certain extent, and both will make up.
The article in the Times today says just the opposite. Apple needs them more. NBC's sales over iTunes is not important to them yet, while Apple's entire strategy depends on it.
Like it or not, Jobs is going to have to learn to cooperate more. Right now, he's got a case of Hubris. Just because it's worked in the past doesn't mean that it will continue to work.
That's the NYT's opinion. The way NBC has been doing, it should be important to them.
In this particular case, NBC wanted episodes at $4.99 each. Do you think Jobs should have cooperated by giving in to that? Right now, apple is looking like the good guy and NBC the greedy ones with the hubris.
Well, Apple has called NBC's bluff (?) and announced that it is canceling NBC's shows starting in September, so customers won't have to stop watching a show on their iPod in mid-season:
That's the NYT's opinion. The way NBC has been doing, it should be important to them.
In this particular case, NBC wanted episodes at $4.99 each. Do you think Jobs should have cooperated by giving in to that? Right now, apple is looking like the good guy and NBC the greedy ones with the hubris.
That's what you would like to think. I'm pretty sure that the Times has much better sources than any of us here.
Not true at all. That is a fanboy perception. None of the Tv or movie companies are selling enough over iTunes to make even the slightest dent in their sales.
If it's insignificant, then why did NBC credit iTunes with saving The Office, which otherwise would have been cancelled due to low ratings? I guess Angela Bromstead, president of NBC Universal Television Studio, is a "fanboy"?
And why do you consider apple unsuccessful at getting tv content? They have a large number of shows including many of the top rated ones like CSI, Grey's, Housewives, Lost, 24, etc. Who has been more successful at making money on TV content online than apple/itunes?
And while NBC pulling this off could inspire others to follow, NBC doing this and failing could inspire others to stick with iTunes.
Quote:
Originally Posted by melgross
That's what you would like to think. I'm pretty sure that the Times has much better sources than any of us here.
The NYT has been wrong before and will be wrong again. You didn't answer my question - if you were Jobs and NBC demanded $4.99 an episode, would you give in to that?
Well, Apple has called NBC's bluff (?) and announced that it is canceling NBC's shows starting in September, so customers won't have to stop watching a show on their iPod in mid-season:
Awesome, in one fell swoop Apple turned the situation around. NBC is now the bad guy, and all they other networks know that Apple will dump them if they don't play ball (if they can afford to dump NBC, which is 30% of the TV downloads, then they can dump anybody).
That's the NYT's opinion. The way NBC has been doing, it should be important to them.
In this particular case, NBC wanted episodes at $4.99 each. Do you think Jobs should have cooperated by giving in to that? Right now, apple is looking like the good guy and NBC the greedy ones with the hubris.
I wish that you would take your uninformed opinion and relate it to some facts. I have far more regard for what the Times, and the WSJ says. Nothing personal, but you are doing no more than hopefully guessing that Apple will have its way.
Jobs has shown NO nterest in compromising at all, as you well know.
Those numbers are very likely just a starting negotiation point. Jobs starts at $1.99 and they start at $4.99. That's the way it works.
I'm not saying that higher prices are good, but you can't totally dictate what you content providers should get. They have to have a say in it.
If prices went up, and sales went down, then that would be information they would need to consider.
But, it's more than that. There is the bundling, and security issuse brought up.
Again, they have to be negotiated.
I can see Universal giving its requirements across the table, and Jobs sitting with his arms crossed, saying "I don't care".
If it's insignificant, then why did NBC credit iTunes with saving The Office, which otherwise would have been cancelled due to low ratings? I guess Angela Bromstead, president of NBC Universal Television Studio, is a "fanboy"?
Because that was when selling Tv shows over iTunes was new, and exciting. Apple sold thousands of them. But, that's not very much, by itself. As internet sales become more common, that kind of thing will lesson, as it always does.
{quote}
And why do you consider apple unsuccessful at getting tv content? They have a large number of shows including many of the top rated ones like CSI, Grey's, Housewives, Lost, 24, etc. Who has been more successful at making money on TV content online than apple/itunes?[/quote]
The estimate is that Apple has but a fraction of the Tv shows that are offered on DVD, and a much smaller fraction of shows produced from the cable networks.
Quote:
And while NBC pulling this off could inspire others to follow, NBC doing this and failing could inspire others to stick with iTunes.
Thre is no such thing as a sure thing, of course. But, sales of Tv shows are very small, not enough to affect any companies bottom line.
The fight isn't over what is available now, but what will be available in the future, and that is very much in doubt.
They want to get these issues straightened out before sales do rise much. They don't want to be in the situation they are in with music sales, where itunes forced the companies to offer their songs for %99 to everyone. It would become a defacto pricing scheme.
Quote:
The NYT has been wrong before and will be wrong again. You didn't answer my question - if you were Jobs and NBC demanded $4.99 an episode, would you give in to that?
Of course, they are wrong sometimes, but not about these kinds of things. and what is your recoed here?
I would negotiate. That's what I did with my businesses.
Comments
No, they're starting their own service because they don't realize how much they need Apple. Tons of companies have started their own competing services, have any been remotely successful. And they'll realize it once their service is running and nobody is using it...and they end up shutting it down before long.
NBC can't win, apple has all the leverage.
Just look at it this way:
1 NBC goes on their own
2 NBC has to tell stockholders that profits are down
3 Stockholders: "Why?"
4 NBC: "iTunes revenues are gone and hulu revenues come nowhere close to replacing that lost revenue"
5 Stockholders tear NBC a new one
6 NBC goes groveling back to apple and signs with itunes again
I hope it goes that way. Then again, if NBC somehow pulls through and succeeds Apple could be in a whole lot of trouble.
It's like you're actually trying to limit the market for your content, which sounds like a winning strategy! I'd say you owe a big bonus of bananas to whichever chimp is running the show over there!
I hope it goes that way. Then again, if NBC somehow pulls through and succeeds Apple could be in a whole lot of trouble.
Yeah, they could become 'beleaguered"
Will it cost them iPod or Mac sales? I think not.
Not so sure about that. NBC just has to sell ads to support "Hulu" and they are already good at selling ads on TV. I wouldn't doubt that they'll be smarter about offering content for sale, and that content could easily be moved into iTunes once purchased... and they get all the profits, and absorb all of the costs to do this.
But they'll need traffic to sell adds. It's a tough business to break into at this point.
I hope it goes that way. Then again, if NBC somehow pulls through and succeeds Apple could be in a whole lot of trouble.
Anything is possible. But I think the odds are against NBC.
Are most current itunes/nbc consumers going to accept a big price hike?
Will they accept commercials?
Will they accept something that isn't compatible with itunes or ipod, or isn't downloadable?
And if the answer to these is no, are they going to download pirate copies or just stop watching that show?
I just don't think NBC has much if anything to their advantage, especially since so many others have tried to compete with itunes and failed.
Big loss for AppleTV, what a joke. Now if AppleTV just had an onboard HDTV tuner, we could "download" the NBC shows for free.
All of this sounds like pre-negotiation noise......
NBC needs Apple as much, if not more, than the other way around. It is a close-to-last-place major network that is seeking traction. The parent company GE is watching closely for any missteps. If they dump a major distribution channel that offers it a future growth opportunity, I am sure that Mr. Immelt will have a word or two for NBC's leadership.
That said, I don't see why NBC shouldn't have greater say over bundling or repricing its content. The iTunes store has become an incoherent clutter anyway (compared to its original simplicity and elegance), and it is not clear to me that adding things such as bundling (or even differential pricing) will add much to the mess that it has already become. Just add two extra icons/links to the millions already there: "Bundles" and "Not $1.99." No one will notice.
The article in the Times today says just the opposite. Apple needs them more. NBC's sales over iTunes is not important to them yet, while Apple's entire strategy depends on it.
Like it or not, Jobs is going to have to learn to cooperate more. Right now, he's got a case of Hubris. Just because it's worked in the past doesn't mean that it will continue to work.
-=|Mgkwho
I don't understand the NBCs position on this. It seems to me that they are negotiating from a position of weakness. I can hear SJ talking to the NBC guys now; "there's this thing called BitTorrent. Have you heard of it?'
iPods will sell. NBC and the other studios can get on iTunes and make some money off the iPod train or they can get steamrolled by it.
I wonder if the NBC guys heard of the Sony Connect Store?
Nope! The other way around.
Tv sales are very small right now. They hardly count to the media companies.
Don't forget that, so far, Apple has managed to get only a small fraction of Tv shows, and an even tinier fraction of movies.
Those companies are moving very slowly. They don't want to be in the bind others are in with music.
Tv shows and movies are finding other outlets over the net right now. Apple could be bypassed entirely if they aren't careful.
No, they're starting their own service because they don't realize how much they need Apple. Tons of companies have started their own competing services, have any been remotely successful. And they'll realize it once their service is running and nobody is using it...and they end up shutting it down before long.
NBC can't win, apple has all the leverage.
Just look at it this way:
1 NBC goes on their own
2 NBC has to tell stockholders that profits are down
3 Stockholders: "Why?"
4 NBC: "iTunes revenues are gone and hulu revenues come nowhere close to replacing that lost revenue"
5 Stockholders tear NBC a new one
6 NBC goes groveling back to apple and signs with itunes again
Not true at all. That is a fanboy perception. None of the Tv or movie companies are selling enough over iTunes to make even the slightest dent in their sales.
The reason why Apple has been so unsuccessful in getting movies, and to a lessor extent Tv shows, is because companies are sitting back to see what will happen.
None of them, including Disney, wants Apple to have control over their distribution or profits.
So if ONE network leaves, they won't have ANY content to sell? I guess you missed the tons of other shows available on iTunes? NBC would only make a dent if they got all the other networks to join them and negociate together. Leaving on their own will just increase piracy of their material and decrease the number of people watching their shows.
And NBC has had many of the lowest ranked shows for the last couple years, with a couple exceptions like Heroes, their ratings have been awful. With a lineup as bad as theirs, will people miss them much?
According to the Times today, Universal has 4-% of the video content sales on iTunes.
If they pull this off, then others will do the same thing. The article said that the other companies are eyeing this carefully.
We may see an agreement though. Apple might give in to a certain extent, and both will make up.
The article in the Times today says just the opposite. Apple needs them more. NBC's sales over iTunes is not important to them yet, while Apple's entire strategy depends on it.
Like it or not, Jobs is going to have to learn to cooperate more. Right now, he's got a case of Hubris. Just because it's worked in the past doesn't mean that it will continue to work.
That's the NYT's opinion. The way NBC has been doing, it should be important to them.
In this particular case, NBC wanted episodes at $4.99 each. Do you think Jobs should have cooperated by giving in to that? Right now, apple is looking like the good guy and NBC the greedy ones with the hubris.
http://playlistmag.com/news/2007/08/...snbc/index.php
That's the NYT's opinion. The way NBC has been doing, it should be important to them.
In this particular case, NBC wanted episodes at $4.99 each. Do you think Jobs should have cooperated by giving in to that? Right now, apple is looking like the good guy and NBC the greedy ones with the hubris.
That's what you would like to think. I'm pretty sure that the Times has much better sources than any of us here.
Not true at all. That is a fanboy perception. None of the Tv or movie companies are selling enough over iTunes to make even the slightest dent in their sales.
If it's insignificant, then why did NBC credit iTunes with saving The Office, which otherwise would have been cancelled due to low ratings? I guess Angela Bromstead, president of NBC Universal Television Studio, is a "fanboy"?
And why do you consider apple unsuccessful at getting tv content? They have a large number of shows including many of the top rated ones like CSI, Grey's, Housewives, Lost, 24, etc. Who has been more successful at making money on TV content online than apple/itunes?
And while NBC pulling this off could inspire others to follow, NBC doing this and failing could inspire others to stick with iTunes.
That's what you would like to think. I'm pretty sure that the Times has much better sources than any of us here.
The NYT has been wrong before and will be wrong again. You didn't answer my question - if you were Jobs and NBC demanded $4.99 an episode, would you give in to that?
Well, Apple has called NBC's bluff (?) and announced that it is canceling NBC's shows starting in September, so customers won't have to stop watching a show on their iPod in mid-season:
http://playlistmag.com/news/2007/08/...snbc/index.php
Awesome, in one fell swoop Apple turned the situation around. NBC is now the bad guy, and all they other networks know that Apple will dump them if they don't play ball (if they can afford to dump NBC, which is 30% of the TV downloads, then they can dump anybody).
That's the NYT's opinion. The way NBC has been doing, it should be important to them.
In this particular case, NBC wanted episodes at $4.99 each. Do you think Jobs should have cooperated by giving in to that? Right now, apple is looking like the good guy and NBC the greedy ones with the hubris.
I wish that you would take your uninformed opinion and relate it to some facts. I have far more regard for what the Times, and the WSJ says. Nothing personal, but you are doing no more than hopefully guessing that Apple will have its way.
Jobs has shown NO nterest in compromising at all, as you well know.
Those numbers are very likely just a starting negotiation point. Jobs starts at $1.99 and they start at $4.99. That's the way it works.
I'm not saying that higher prices are good, but you can't totally dictate what you content providers should get. They have to have a say in it.
If prices went up, and sales went down, then that would be information they would need to consider.
But, it's more than that. There is the bundling, and security issuse brought up.
Again, they have to be negotiated.
I can see Universal giving its requirements across the table, and Jobs sitting with his arms crossed, saying "I don't care".
Nope! The other way around.
Tv sales are very small right now. They hardly count to the media companies.
Don't forget that, so far, Apple has managed to get only a small fraction of Tv shows, and an even tinier fraction of movies.
Those companies are moving very slowly. They don't want to be in the bind others are in with music.
Tv shows and movies are finding other outlets over the net right now. Apple could be bypassed entirely if they aren't careful.
We will see who's got stronger hand in time.
BitTorrent and 100 million iPods say Apple have the stronger hand.
ITunes isn't a major profit center for Apple. It only helps to drive iPod sales.
It makes September 5th a little more interesting IMO. If Apple release nice video iPods I think that only increases the pressure on NBC.
If it's insignificant, then why did NBC credit iTunes with saving The Office, which otherwise would have been cancelled due to low ratings? I guess Angela Bromstead, president of NBC Universal Television Studio, is a "fanboy"?
Because that was when selling Tv shows over iTunes was new, and exciting. Apple sold thousands of them. But, that's not very much, by itself. As internet sales become more common, that kind of thing will lesson, as it always does.
{quote}
And why do you consider apple unsuccessful at getting tv content? They have a large number of shows including many of the top rated ones like CSI, Grey's, Housewives, Lost, 24, etc. Who has been more successful at making money on TV content online than apple/itunes?[/quote]
The estimate is that Apple has but a fraction of the Tv shows that are offered on DVD, and a much smaller fraction of shows produced from the cable networks.
And while NBC pulling this off could inspire others to follow, NBC doing this and failing could inspire others to stick with iTunes.
Thre is no such thing as a sure thing, of course. But, sales of Tv shows are very small, not enough to affect any companies bottom line.
The fight isn't over what is available now, but what will be available in the future, and that is very much in doubt.
They want to get these issues straightened out before sales do rise much. They don't want to be in the situation they are in with music sales, where itunes forced the companies to offer their songs for %99 to everyone. It would become a defacto pricing scheme.
The NYT has been wrong before and will be wrong again. You didn't answer my question - if you were Jobs and NBC demanded $4.99 an episode, would you give in to that?
Of course, they are wrong sometimes, but not about these kinds of things. and what is your recoed here?
I would negotiate. That's what I did with my businesses.